Can the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission hold Hunter Biden accountable for the "laptop door

SEC's position shifts: Meme tokens are not considered securities, Hunter Biden's LAPTOP token controversy is difficult to get regulatory intervention

Investors seeking regulatory intervention in Hunter Biden's "LAPTOP" Meme token collapse may need to look away from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). SEC management appointed by the Trump administration ruled in an employee statement in February 2025 that Meme tokens are not classified as securities and that any investor who is damaged in a transaction is not protected by federal securities laws.

Review of the LAPTOP Token Crash

Looking back at the epic scale of the LAPTP token crash, blockchain analyst firm Arkham reported that after the token was released on the Base blockchain on Wednesday, the price plunged 95% in just 30 minutes.

Ironically, it is this SEC employee statement, which provided the "green light" for the first projects to launch TRUMP and MELANIA Meme tokens, that now also protects the son of former U.S. President Joe Biden. The irony reaches its peak when considering the background of how physical laptops became the primary weapon of attack against Joe Biden and led to Hunter Biden's imprisonment on a federal gun conviction. However, after the appearance of the dollar sign and a tokenized version of the object, everything seemed to have become "compliant" according to the current SEC's interpretation.

Hunter Biden is in the SEC's "safe area"

Throughout the promotion process of the LAPTOP token, Hunter Biden did not commit any equity, ownership or profits. He made it clear that he should not be expected to let the token appreciate, which was particularly clear in an update released on his Medium platform: "You should not expect us or anyone else to increase the value of this token for you."

LAPTOP's token economics model also does not fully fit the typical "rug pull" setting. Despite the token distribution mechanism, LAPTOP's price plummeted from a fully diluted valuation of $144 billion estimated by Arkham two minutes after its release to $5 billion in thirty minutes. Bubblemaps, an analyst firm that often tracks such high-risk launches, called the launch a "bloody massacre." According to the Lookonchain logo, one buyer entered at about $218 per token, reducing the $200,000 investment to $3000. As of the release of this report, LAPTOP was trading at approximately US$0.79.

The LAPTOP team blamed the sharp fluctuations on "predatory sniper robots" and initial liquidity that was unable to absorb market demand, and blamed the blame on market makers. The team said on Medium that it will deploy 4 million tokens to inject seeds into the Aerodrome liquidity pool. In addition, with the settlement results of two forecast events reaching "Yes" and the destruction of 10 million tokens, the supply in circulation in the first week is expected to decrease by approximately 1%.

Which regulators can take action against Meme tokens?

As of February 2025, the SEC's Corporate Finance Division ruled that Meme tokens did not meet the Howey Test requirement of "earning profits through the efforts of others" and wrote: "Buyers and holders of Meme coins are not protected by federal securities laws."

However, legal analysis published on the Harvard and Colombia University Corporate Governance Blog highlights two important premises: If a token masquerades as Meme but is essentially operated as a security, its economic reality will still be examined; and fraud can still be pursued by the Department of Justice (DOJ), the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), and state regulators. Commissioner Caroline Crenshaw has objected, warning that the exemption clause could become a loophole, but the actual effect still exists: securities regulators are not the most direct enforcement agency dealing with LAPTOP incidents.

Policy background and similar cases

The employee statement was released after Trump took office and appointed new SEC leadership, and immediately after his personal launch of tokens. TRUMP tokens are also moving in a similar manner to LAPTOP, with their price falling causing losses of more than $2 billion held in more than 800,000 wallets, according to Better Markets. Cryptopolitan has pointed out that within minutes of the release of the MELANIA token, the TRUMP token also evaporated about 55% of its value.

Today, the explanation that allows two Trump tokens to be traded without securities registration also forms a barrier between the SEC and Hunter Biden's LAPTOP token.